


To Love and Be Loved

by meloshi



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotionally Repressed, Fluff and Angst, Love Confessions, M/M, and lauriam wants in to get them out, bc logic over feelings you know, even is rly emotionally repressed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 02:53:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18540832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meloshi/pseuds/meloshi
Summary: "I have been stripped of who I was and can no longer find the courage to paint a face for myself...""Then let me paint it for you."





	To Love and Be Loved

**Author's Note:**

> please its 3am,,,, just take it from me,,,,,,  
> marvex was one of my very first otps and i loved the dynamic they had as nobodies, but this is a little bit different and more... emotional as would expected from their somebodies - kinda au-ish? no keyblades/organisation xiii etc. just people being people in which Even relies on facts over fiction (but really, what is fiction but facts bent by the power of context?), Lauriam is in love and wants Even to realise that too, but both are stubborn enough to leave their obvious romantic feelings for each other up in the air for a year :///
> 
> anyways, i hope you enjoy reading and like the story! don't forget to click that kudos button ;0  
> Also!! leave a comment if you have the time! i'd love to hear what people think considering this is my first time writing MarVex as their somebodies (LaurEven? Evenium? idk dude)
> 
> <3

Even did not open up to people.

It went against the nature he had cultivated as his personality over years of work, closing himself off both physically and emotionally.

Cold, hard fact were what he believed in. Their tangible forms, the proof they carried, all of the understanding that came with facts were what Even believed in. After all, fact was quite simply that: fact. Unaltered without a meaningful proof, they were something solid that he could rely on without fail.

Emotions were nothing like that.

They would wobble under the pressure of something as simple as a smile and morph into weakness, into pain, into regret... No good had ever come from being open with his emotions and he didn't want to leave it up to chance to see if it would ever happen.

Even had learnt to conceal his feelings behind a facade of cold indifference that made for a difficult life when things began to go against the plan he thought would make for the easiest life.

First came the child, Ienzo, quiet and frozen in his past, refusing to speak from the shock of all that had happened to him. He had taught Even to open his heart to another for the first time in a long, long time. It was a learning curve, slow starting and too much at once, but they made it work. Just about.

Hiccups and bumps along the way but still... The two of them became closer, able to speak about feelings in a way that neither of them had expected to be able to, but a child was no person for Even to dump his deepest of fears on.

No.

That came next.

They met through Dilan. A fighter, a writer, a florist, a lover, an artist all rolled up in one man who went by the name of Lauriam.

There not a single thing he could do from falling hard and falling fast after quite literally falling hard and fast into Lauriam's arms from tripping over his own feet and down the stairs.

His heart would beat too fast, his face would flush red from the things that the pink haired man would do so naturally, and there was nothing he could do that would stop his body from reacting to the other man.

Even had asked Lauriam to dinner, multiple times, but never pushed further than that, in fear of just what would happen if he took the leap and tried to connect to Lauriam romantically. What would that do for Ienzo? What would that do for himself? If it went well, the two of them would have something else to lean on, to trust in, but if it went badly, then both of them would be broken from the trust they'd attempted to put in.

Love was a risk he couldn't afford to indulge in. Not anymore.

But such was what brought Even to the situation he now found himself in.

He was sat at his desk in the lab of the castle turned research facility/home, holding his ground in a conversation that had begun: "Why are you so afraid to love?"

"Afraid to love? You don't know what you're talking about." He had rebutted, scoffing and pretending to sort through piles of writings. Lauriam had finally confronted him after a year of knowing each other and months of almost being in a relationship, demanding to know why he held himself back.

"I don't know what I'm talking about? You don't know what you're talking about! Damn it, Even, I love you and you do I, yet you refuse to allow your heart to speak for you over your head." Lauriam had slammed his hand down on the sheets of paper, stilling Even in his tracks of shuffling through them meaninglessly, and glared at him, a clash of blue and green both unyielding to the other.

"Y-you cannot speak for my heart when I have said no such thing on the matter! Speculation! That's all the cards in your hand have to back them up..." Even had stammered, looking away and pushing his wheeled chair further away from Lauriam.

There was silence for a moment. It hung heavy in the air, filled to the brim with tension and about to overflow if it weren't for Lauriam's next words. Even could tell they had been chosen carefully, picked specifically to elicit a response from him, and despite having known this he still replied.

"That speculation you find so weak is my strength. It's because I believe you can love that I stay here by your side, hoping for something more when I know you will refuse me such a thing!"

"And what if I refuse it because you deserve better than hope inevitably lost?!"

Even prided himself on having facts to back him up through even the hardest of times, and yet he found himself losing to emotion.

It had been too long. Far too long. Even had forgotten the feeling of letting his voice roam free and letting his reasoning come from things impossible to grasp completely and he felt powerful.

"Inevitably lost? My hope in you will never be lost so long as I draw breath." The statement sounded so much like a fact, the way it was declared with such determination. Emotions were so powerful.

"I'm not what you want, trust me..." It was a secession from Even, falling tired of the exertion that came with letting out bottled up thoughts and feelings. He sighed deeply, arms falling to his sides and his back slouching from how weary he felt himself becoming.

"And how can you say that?" Lauriam dropped down on a knee, in front of Even, turning the chair his way so they could face each other. The blonde refused to look Lauriam in the eye, deciding to focus instead on the joints of his fingers as they clenched and unclenched around thin air.

"I'm not... After everything that's happened... After all I've put myself through...!" Even wrung his hands in his lap and shook his head in defeat before having fought. The tears of years gone past pricked at the corner of his eyes, stinging with a pain he didn't realise he could still feel. It was with a heavy sigh that he finished his sentence. "I have been stripped of who I was and can no longer find the courage to paint a face for myself..."

Lauriam looked upon Even's pained expression, twisted with regret and couldn't help but reach out a hand to cup the other man's face with.

"Then let me paint it for you."

Such plain words and yet they held a meaning that was perhaps a little too much for Even's susceptible brain to handle - there was nothing to be done about the tears that flowed freely down his cheeks and the rough sobs that soon followed, uninhibited and free to roar out the years of restrained sadness that dwelled within his heart.

Soft lips pressed against Even's slightly parted ones, the taste of salty tears tainting it with the realisation that he was crying and prompting more tears to fall unwittingly.

"Your name is Even, you father a wonderful child who you managed to get to trust you despite the hardships he'd faced, I see you so passionate about your work that you can get lost it - your determination and intelligence not for show but being used with purpose. You hold yourself beneath others when it comes to anything other than science but you listen to them and show interest because you're a polite person who cannot stand to hurt another is you can help it." Lauriam spoke without pause, as if he had planned this all when it couldn't very well be possible for him to have rehearsed such a speech before. "You frown when things don't work out how you expect, your eyebrows tug and form little wrinkles on your forehead and around your eyes. When you smile, properly smile, you don't notice it, and everyone can tell because you don't rush to fiddle with your hair and hide it behind your usual cold demeanour. It's a lopsided smile full of knowing that there is happiness in the world even when it seems like the darkest of times... And you are so loved."

The words seeped into Even's body through his ears and affection followed from the sweep of Lauriam's thumb over the pale knuckles of his fist and the gentle touches of Lauriam tucking stray strands of blonde behind his ear carefully, so as to not hurt him by accidentally tugging or pulling unexpectedly.

"You are so loved, by your friends, by your co-workers, by Ienzo, and by me."

There was love for him, held in the hearts of people he knew so well and yet never showed his appreciation for so openly. And the love that Lauriam reserved specially for him? It was love that Even had never felt in such a way before, and yet he knew he couldn't live without it again if he somehow managed to let to slip through his fingers after this night.

"And..." He started to speak, cutting of Lauriam, if the other man had any more words to say. He paused to clear his throat, not noticing how choked up it had gotten from the crying.

"And?" A hand held itself atop of Even's still fidgeting ones.

"And..." Even lifted a hand and interlaced it with Lauriam's own. "I love you."

An admittance to something more powerful, more meaningful, than fact. An admittance to his emotions that he found he still had the ability to feel even after all his years of shutting them out.

He was loved and he loved and he was moving on to a new chapter in which love would reign supreme.


End file.
